Percy and Friends read Lightning Thief with Gods
by lovely1227
Summary: ya I know this type of story is so cliche its and understatement to call it cliche but I wanted to try to write this rated T for any cussing or swearing this is basically what the title says
1. Story Time

**I know this has been done so many times its an understatement to call it cliche but i wanna try it out.**

**_STORY TIME..._**

Up on Olympus, Poseidon and Athena were fighting. It was one of their usual fights. That's until Hermes flew in carrying a package.

"Silence!" Yelled Zeus. Poseidon and Athena immediately became silent. "Now, Hermes, what do we have here?" Hermes walked to Zeus and handed him the package.

"Its a package, sir... Here it came with a note," Hermes handed Zeus the note and he began to read.

_" Dear Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Hestia, Hades, Ares, Hermes, Hephaestus, Aphrodite, Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Dionysus," _

As Zeus read thee names off the gods that weren't there before appeared._  
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_"I am sorry for the inconvenience but I have sent this package to help you with the future to come. I have taken the liberty of having books made about a special hero. During your reading of these books the main characters will appear... well... the non deceased at least. For now i will only be sending this special hero. Expect him soon..._

_sincerely,  
>Apollo from the future<em>"

Just then there was a flash of golden light and a boy about 16 with black hair and sea green eyes.

"Hey," he said. Everybody was shocked_._

"I guess I'll read first_,_" he said walking over to Zeus, grabbing the box, opening it and pulling out five books.

He opened the one that looked like the first in the series and started to read.

"**Percy Jackson and the Olympians the Lightning Thief**"

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><p><strong>ya i know it was short but its just the intro the next chapter will be longer oh and if you dont like my grammar or if i did somthing wrong jus tell me<strong>

**WITH LOVE**

**lovely1227  
><strong>


	2. Vaporizing my Teacher

**So yea i kept my promise and... wait did i even promise anything? I do not own the Percy Jackson series or characters**

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><p><strong>Chapter Two<strong>

**I ACCIDENTALLY VAPORIZE MY PRE-ALGEBRA TEACHER**

"**I Accidentally Vaporize my Pre-Algebra Teacher**," said the boy.

"Well this sounds interesting... Wait can you tell us your name?" Asked an out-of-daze Apollo.

"Oh, Yeah!" The boy exclaimed, pulling a folded piece of paper out of his pocket, "Ahem... My name is Percy Jackson and I am the son of... ! Any way you'll find out later."

Poseidon's eye's widened. _Could it be. My little five year-old Percy_.

"Okay that's all we needed to know..." He trailed off, pondering who his godly parent was.

**Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.**

"Nobody does," Percy said glumly.

**If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is:**

"Oh no, I'm giving advise," Percy said. Athena turned to look at him. She narrowed her eyes. Percy didn't notice

**close this book right now. Believe what ever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.**

Artemis shook her head. "Ya... um how do I say this without scaring you... It won't work."

**Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

Hermes put his hand to his heart. "Well, then," he said.

**If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.**

**But if you recognize yourself in these pages—if you feel something stirring inside—stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before **_**they **_**sense it too, and they'll come for you.**

"Wait, who's they?" Apollo asked in confusion. Everyone rolled their eyes at his cluelessness**  
><strong>

**Don't say I didn't warn you.**

"You didn't warn me," Hermes, Apollo and Ares said at the same time, looking serious.

They burst out laughing. Everyone rolled their eyes

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

"Yup, that's me," Percy stated plainly.

**I'm twelve years old. Until a **_**few **_**months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a ****private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.**

"At least he's in New York," Poseidon said relieved. Athena's eyes narrowed trying to put the pieces of the puzzles together.

**Am I a troubled kid?**

"Yep," everyone but Percy said.

**Yeah. You could say that.**

"HA! You agree," Apollo

**I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan— twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.**

"That sounds fun," Athena said at the same time Poseidon said, "That sounds like torture." **  
><strong>

**I know—it sounds like torture.**

Percy smiled slightly, Athena's eyes narrowing once more.

**Most Yancy field trips were.**

**But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.**

"Isn't that the pseudonym Chiron uses?" Percy smiled slyly at this question

**Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.**

**I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.**

Ares scoffed. "Ya that will happen," he said sarcastically **  
><strong>

**Boy, was I wrong.**

"See?."

**See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway.**

Demeter looked a bit disturbed. "Um exactly what were you aiming for?" Percy shrugged

**And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.**

"Yes we do."**  
><strong>

**This trip, I was determined to be good.**

**All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover**

**in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.**

Aphrodite's face turned a sickly shade of green.

**Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled.**

"So he's a satyr," Athena guessed.

Percy rolled his eyes. "Like I'm gonna tell you anything." **  
><strong>

**He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

"Way to blow your cover."

**Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

**"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

"DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!" Ares chanted **  
><strong>

**Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."**

**He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.**

**"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

**"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."**

**Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there.**

"Me too."

**In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

**Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.**

**He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.**

**It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

"Longer than that, boy" Artemis said rolling her eyes. **  
><strong>

**He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a **_**stele, **_**for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

"Wimp," Ares coughed. Poseidon glared at him and Athena gasped. She had figured it out.

Poseidon had heard her gasp and looked at her pleadingly not to tell. Athena closed her eyes for a second and opened them again to say "OK"

Poseidon shot her a soft grateful smile to thank her and went back to his own thoughts

**Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

"I wonder..." Athena started but trailed off.

**From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

**One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."**

"Well, that confirms my theory," Athena looked a little worried but that went unnoticed.

**Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.**

**Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you **_**shut up**_**?"**

**It came out louder than I meant it to.**

"Of course it did," Hermes stated unsurprised.**  
><strong>

**The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

**"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"**

**My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."**

**Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?**

**I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

"It just _has_ to be that one doesn't it?" Demeter asked glumly.

**"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied.**

"Of course not," Athena said, "you have to do better than that."

**"And he **_**did **_**this because ..."**

**"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god,**

"He _wishes_ he was that awesome!" cried Apollo

**and—"**

**"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

**"Titan," I corrected myself. "And ... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead.**

"She always liked you best," Poseidon told Zeus.

"Oh, please. Not this again," Athena pleaded.

**And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"**

**"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

**"—and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."**

**Some snickers from the group.**

"Why are they snickering? You got it right," Athena knit her eyebrows.

**Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"**

**"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

"I think we all know the answer to that,"

**"Busted," Grover muttered.**

**"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

**At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

**I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

"Of course you don't," Athena said rolling her eyes. Poseidon glared at her.**  
><strong>

**"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

**The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.**

**Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

**I knew that was coming.**

**I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

**Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go— intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.**

"Well over a thousand."

**"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

**"About the Titans?"**

**"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."**

"Should I really have learned that?" Percy said.

"Probably not."

**"Oh."**

**"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."**

**I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

**I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever **_**lived, **_**and their mother, and what god they worshipped.**

"He would be the one," Hermes said rolling his eyes.

**But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C— in my life. No—he didn't expect me to be **_**as good; **_**he expected me to be **_**better. **_**And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

**I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

"He probably was..." Athena stated.

**He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.**

**The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.**

**Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York State had been weird since Christmas.**

"I wonder why," he wondered sarcastically.

A few of the gods gave him a weird look.

**We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

**Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

**Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from **_**that **_**school—the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.**

"Did you succeed?" Demeter asked carefully.

"No," Percy admitted.

**"Detention?" Grover asked.**

**"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean—I'm not a genius."**

"We know," everyone said. Percy glared at them.

**Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

Apollo, Hermes and Ares burst into laughter.

**I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

**I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

"Awwww," all the females cooed.**  
><strong>

**Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.**

**I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends—I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists—and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.**

Percy tried to hold in his anger.

**"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

"Attractive," Apollo stated sarcastically and appalled.

**I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

"_Wave?_" Zeus questioned looking at Poseidon_  
><em>

**I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

**Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

**Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see—"**

**"—the water—"**

**"—like it grabbed her—"**

"POSEIDON! I can't believe you broke the oath! You will suffer severely!"

Athena's eyes widened. "Percy, you look six-teen. Does that mean you're-" she was cut off

"YES! She didn't call me sea spawn! I'm one step closer to being accepted!"**  
><strong>

**I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

**As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey—"**

"Hmmm, I wonder if she was waiting for you to show your powers," Athena mused

**"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

"Uh, ya, even I know that wasn't the smartest thing to say," Apollo stated.

**That wasn't the right thing to say.**

**"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

**"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. **_**I **_**pushed her."**

**I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.**

"Aw such a sweet satyr..." Aphrodite trailed.

**She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

**"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.**

**"But—"**

**"You—**_**will**_—**stay—here."**

**Grover looked at me desperately.**

**"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

**"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "**_**Now**_**."**

**Nancy Bobofit smirked.**

**I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare.**

"Oh, I bet mine is better," Hermes said smugly

Percy glared at him and Hermes shivered.

"Never minded."

**Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

**How'd she get there so fast?**

"Alecto sometimes forgets about human speed and stuff," Hades commented. Everyone jumped forgetting Hades was in the room.

**I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

"No son, not this time," Poseidon said worriedly.**  
><strong>

**I wasn't so sure.**

**I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

**Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.**

"Well. That must be a very interesting book. Kinda like the one we are reading now," commented Hera

**I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

**Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.**

**But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

**I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.**

**Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

**Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

**Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...**

"She probably does," Hades muttered.**  
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**"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

**I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

**She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"**

"Get away with what?" Asked Hermes.

Percy shook his head.

**The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

**She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.**

Everyone snorted doubtfully.

**I said, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."**

**Thunder shook the building.**

**"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

**I didn't know what she was talking about.**

**All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room.**

"Yeah, that _has_ to be it," said Athena rolling her eyes.

**Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on **_**Tom Sawyer **_**from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

"It is a good book," Athena looked offended

Percy shivered.

"Remember _I_ can't read," Percy reminded them.

**"Well?" she demanded.**

**"Ma'am, I don't..."**

**"Your time is up," she hissed.**

Poseidon was clutching the arms of his chairs.**  
><strong>

**Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

**Then things got even stranger.**

**Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

**"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

Percy and Poseidon smiled fondly of the sword.

Everybody was amazed at how similar they looked

**Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

**With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword—Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

**Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.**

**My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

**She snarled, "Die, honey!"**

"She should really drop the 'Honey' thing."

Hades shook his head and said, "Not likely."

**And she flew straight at me.**

**Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

**The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. **_**Hisss!**_

"It's weird how he's connecting himself to you, Sea Sponge," Athena mused

**Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.**

**I was alone.**

**There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

"Is that the mist or did it change back to pen form?" Demeter asked, curious.

Percy shrugged not-knowingly.

**Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.**

**My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

Every one snorted.

**Had I imagined the whole thing?**

**I went back outside.**

**It had started to rain.**

**Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

**I said, "Who?"**

**"Our **_**teacher.**_ **Duh!"**

**I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

**She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

**I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

**He said, "Who?"**

"That was really annoying!" Percy groaned.

Everyone laughed.

**But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

"That satyr needs some lying lessons," Hermes muttered.

**"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."**

**Thunder boomed overhead.**

**I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

**I went over to him.**

**He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."**

Everyone chuckled at that.

**I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.**

**"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

**He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

**"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

**He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"**

"That's the end of the chapter," Percy said. "Who wants to read next?"

"I would like to," said Demeter.

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><p><strong>Yea Im finished finaly If I said Hestia was in the story just reveiw about it and ill fix it any ways press that little button down there<strong>


	3. Note of Important Importance

**VERY IMPORTANT: I WILL NOT BE UPDATING TILL THE END OF SCHOOL WHICH DONT WORRY IS IN ONLY 6 DAYS SO WORRY NOT MY FELLOW READERS AND REVEIWERS SO YEA **

**WITH LOVE **

**lovely1227  
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	4. Death by Socks

**welcome to chapter 3 enjoy oh and i might get a job as a beta reader be happy and im eating yellow watermelon... yummy**

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><p><strong>THE SOCKS OF DEATH<strong>

Demeter cleared her throat.

"**Three Old Ladies Knit the Socks of Death,"**

**I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly.**

**This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr—a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip—had been our pre-algebra teacher since Christmas.**

" Ugh, that was not fun learning that. It was so confusing," groaned Percy**  
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**Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.**

"That's because you are psycho," Athena said slowly.**  
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**It got so I almost believed them—Mrs. Dodds had never existed.**

**Almost.**

**But Grover couldn't fool me.**

"Of course he couldn't," stated Hermes dryly.

**When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, and then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying.**

**Something was going on. Something **_**had **_**happened at the museum.**

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Apollo muttered.

Percy gave Apollo an innocent smile. "Your welcome, Lieutenant sarcasm."

Hermes gave a fake cough to cover his laugh.

**I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.**

Percy shivered.

**The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows** **in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.**

Athena raised her eyebrow.

**I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from D's to F's.**

**I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.**

**Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.**

"Hey, Athena, whats a sot?" Asked Apollo.

"A drunkard."

**The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.**

**Fine, I told myself. Just fine.**

**I was homesick.**

**I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.**

"AWWWW," all the females cooed, even Athena.

**And yet... there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view** **of the woods outside my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend,** **even if he was a little strange.**

**I worried how he'd survive next year without me.**

**I'd miss Latin class, too—Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.**

**As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for.**

"He wants to impress Chiron." Aphrodite noted.

Percy nodded.

**I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him.**

**The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the **_**Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology **_**across my dorm room. **

Athena glared at Percy.

"Sorry" Percy muttered.

**Words had started swimming off the page, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon,**

**or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.**

Chuckles ran throughout the room the room.

**I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt.**

**I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. **_**I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson.**_

**I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.**

**I'd never asked a teacher for help before. **

"Is _that_ why you're failing?" Athena put her hand to her mouth in mock surprise.

"Be quiet Athena" Poseidon said.

"You know, I was _starting_ to like you. Never mind," stated Percy.

**Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.**

"Awww" Demeter, Aphrodite, and surprisingly Hera cooed. While Apollo, Ares, and Hermes snickered.

Percy glared at them. Ya, they shut up.

**I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor.**

**I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said,**

_**"...**_ **worried about Percy, sir."**

**I froze.**

**I'm not usually an eavesdropper,** **but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult.**

**I inched closer.**

**"... alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the **_**school**_**! Now that we know for sure, and **_**they **_**know too—"**

**"We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."**

**"But he may not have time. The summer solstice dead line— **_**"**_

Athena's eyebrow crept higher.

**"Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can."**

**"Sir, he **_**saw **_**her... ."**

**"His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."**

**"Sir, I ... I can't fail in my duties again." **

"What happened?" Asked Aphrodite curiously.

"Later," was all Percy said.

**Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean."**

**"You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall—"**

"Uh, well then," said Apollo moving his head in a circular motion like a black girl diva. **[Not trying to be racist its just how to describe it so please no offense to the blacks that read this. You can flame about this if you like, but I really am sorry.] **

**The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud.**

"Nice going, Punk," Ares snarled.

"You know? I had a dream once, and in it something eats you," Percy said matter-of-factly.

**Mr. Brunner went silent.**

**My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall.**

**A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.**

**I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.**

**A few seconds later I heard a slow **_**clop-clop-clop, **_**like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, and then moved on.**

**A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.**

**Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."**

"What happened?" asked Demeter.

Percy opened his mouth to speak but thought better of it.

**"Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn ..."**

**"Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow."**

**"Don't remind me."**

**The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office.**

**I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever.**

**Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm.**

**Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he'd been there all night.**

**"Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "You going to be ready for this test?"**

**I didn't answer.**

**"You look awful." He frowned. "Is everything okay?"**

**"Just... tired."**

**I turned so he couldn't read my expression, **

"But you can't hide your emotions," Dionysus stated absent mindedly.

**and started getting ready for bed.**

**I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I'd imagined the whole thing.**

"That may be what you want, but what you need is to believe," stated Athena

**But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was in some kind of danger.**

"What kind of danger?" Apollo challenged.

**The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam,**

"THREE HOURS?" shouted practically everybody.

Percy nodded grimly.

**my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside.**

**For a moment, I was worried he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem.**

**"Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's ... it's for the best."**

**His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips.**

**I mumbled, "Okay, sir."**

**"I mean ..." Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say. "This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time."**

"Uh, well then," said Apollo with the same movements as last time.

**My eyes stung.**

"Wimp" Ares muttered under his breath but was still heard and was splashed with 10 gallons of salt water.

**Here was my favorite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was telling me I was destined to get kicked out.**

**"Right," I said, trembling.**

**"No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say ... you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to be—"**

"Chiron need some pep talk lessons," noted hermes.

**"Thanks," I blurted. "Thanks a lot, sir, for reminding me."**

**"Percy—"**

**But I was already gone.**

**On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothes into my suitcase.**

**The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were **_**rich **_**juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies.**

Percy glanced at his dad mouthing 'sorry'.

**They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city.**

**What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spend my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall.**

**"Oh," one of the guys said. "That's cool."**

**They went back to their conversation as if I'd never existed.**

**The only person I dreaded saying good-bye to was Grover, but as it turned out, I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had, so there we were, together again, heading into the city.**

**During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something bad to happen.**

**Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased. But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound.**

**Finally I couldn't stand it anymore.**

**I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?"**

"OOO! Did you make him pee his pants?" Asked/Shouted Apollo.

He got many crazy looks. Then Ares flipped him off, but no one knows why.

**Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha—what do you mean?"**

**I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam.**

**Grover's eye twitched. "How much **_**did **_**you hear?"**

**"Oh ... not much. What's the summer solstice dead-line?"**

**He winced. "Look, Percy ... I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers …"**

**"Grover—"**

**"And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and ..."**

"Wow, he is a _bad_ lair." Apollo said.

**"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar."**

**His ears turned pink.**

**From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer.**

**The card was in fancy script, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes, but I finally made out something like:**

_**Grover Underwood**_

_**Keeper**_

_**Half-Blood Hill**_

_**Long Island, New York**_

_**(800)**_ _**009-0009**_

"Why do you guys even have those cards, it takes forever for the poor kids to read them," Hera said sympathetically.

**"What's Half—"**

**"Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um ... summer address."**

**My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy.**

"Poor kid," said a sad Aphrodite.

**"Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, if I want to come visit your mansion."**

**He nodded. "Or...or if you need me."**

**"Why would I need you?"**

**It came out harsher than I meant it to.**

**Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I—I kind of have to protect you."**

**I stared at him.**

**All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keeping bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me.**

"How cute it that."

**And here he was acting like he was the one who defended **_**me.**_

**"Grover," I said, "What exactly are you protecting me from?"**

**There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs.**

"Ew," said Apollo

**The driver cursed and steered the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.**

**After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.**

**We were on a stretch of country road—no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.**

"Oo fruit!" Demeter exclaimed.

Hades pinched the bridge of his nose.

**The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of blood red cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice**_**. **_**There were no customers, just three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen.**

"Oh no," Poseidon groaned.

**I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks. The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn.**

**All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses.**

**The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me.**

"Oh gods no," Poseidon's face was pale.

"Dad, relax, I'm right here," Percy said. Poseidon eased a little.

**I looked over at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.**

**"Grover?" I said. "Hey, man—"**

**"Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?"**

All the gods and goddesses held their breath.

**"Yeah. Weird, huh? You think those socks would fit me?"**

"That's not funny, Percy," Poseidon told his son.

**"Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all."**

**The old lady in the middle took out a huge pair of scissors—gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears.**

Poseidon drew a sharp breath.

**I heard Grover catch his breath.**

**"We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on."**

"Listen to they satyr."

**"What?" I said. "It's a thousand degrees in there."**

**"Come on!'" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back.**

**Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle one cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that **_**snip **_**across four lanes of traffic.**

The room fell silent. Percy gestured for Demeter to continue

**Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for—Sasquatch or Godzilla.**

**At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.**

**The passengers cheered.**

**"Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!"**

**Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu.**

"That doesn't sound good."

"It wasn't," Percy shook his head

**Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.**

**"Grover?"**

**"Yeah?"**

**"What are you not telling me?"**

**He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?"**

**"You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like ... Mrs. Dodds, are they?"**

"They are much worse," said Athena.

**His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds. He said, "Just tell me what you saw."**

**"The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn."**

**He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost—older.**

**He said, "You saw her snip the cord."**

**"Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was a big deal.**

**"This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

**"What last time?"**

**"Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth."**

**"Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. "What are you talking about?"**

"Yes, what is he talking about?"

Percy bit his lower lip.

**"Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me."**

**This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could.**

**"Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked.**

**No answer.**

**"Grover—that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?"**

Everyone shivered.

**He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin.**

"Lovely chapter," said Artemis rolling her eyes.

"Who wants to read next?" Asked Demeter

"I will," Athena took the book from Demeter.

"..."

* * *

><p><strong>FINALLY that took forever so ya read and review plz and ya<strong>

**WITH LOVE**

**lovely1227**


	5. Losing Pants Without Losing Dignity

**so Sorry its been so long its just its been over 95 degrees in my room the past 3 weeks and im melting and grovers gonna come in this chapter yea!**

* * *

><p>Losing Pants Without Losing Dignity<p>

Athena raised an eyebrow as she looked at the chapter title, **"Grover Unexpectedly Loses His Pants,"**

Before she could read more there was a blinding flash of gold.

"Whoa, what happened," Grover looked around.

Then he saw Percy.

"Hey, man. Hows it goin', hows my girl friend. Been keeping her out of trouble?" Percy said.

Aphrodite's eyes brightened, "Percy has a girlfriend? Who is she?"

Percy and Grover ignored her. "Dude, she's fine, I'm fine."

"Now that you two have caught up, may I continue reading," asked Athena.

**Confession time: I ditched Grover as soon as we got to the bus terminal.**

"Of course you would. You wouldn't be Percy if you didn't do stupid and dangerous things," said Grover

**I know, I know. It was rude. But Grover was freaking me out, looking at me like I was a dead man, muttering "Why does this always happen?" and "Why does it always have to be sixth grade?"**

"I think that would freak anyone out," said Percy.

"Sorry, man," said Grover.

**Whenever he got upset, Grover's bladder acted up, so I wasn't surprised when, as soon as we got off the bus, he made me promise to wait for him, then made a beeline for the restroom.**

"Well, turns out neither one of you can keep a promise," Said Hades glaring at Poseidon.

"As a matter of fact I have kept many promises. Like I promised to to plant a garden in Manhattan. Tell them, Grover, in our year the garden I started has flourished."

"Oh ya, you should see all the moonlace," said Grover.

**Instead of waiting, I got my suitcase, slipped outside, and caught the first taxi uptown.**

"**East One-hundred-and-fourth and First," I told the driver.**

**A word about my mother, before you meet her.**

**Her name is Sally Jackson and she's the best person in the world,**

"That's an understatement," said Poseidon smiling.

"Aww," cooed Aphrodite and Demeter.

**Which just proves my theory that the best people have the rottenest luck. **

"Too true," Grover muttered to Percy.

Percy nodded in agreement.

**Her own parents died in a plane crash when she was five, and she was raised by an uncle who didn't care much about her. She wanted to be a novelist, so she spent high school working to save enough money for college with a good creative-writing program.**

"As long as she keeps doing what she wants, I give her my blessing," Said Athena.

"What about Paul, he's a teacher?" Percy asked.

"Who's Paul?" Asked Poseidon.

Percy bit his lip he had said to much.

**Then her uncle got cancer, and she had to quit school her senior year to take care of him. After he died, she was left with no money, no family, and no diploma.**

Everyone felt sorry. Anyone who had to go through that...

**The only good break she ever got was meeting my dad.**

Aphrodite coed and Poseidon smiled.

Athena looked at Poseidon but then looked away.

**I don't have any memories of him, just this sort of warm glow, maybe the barest trace of his smile.**

"I visited you once but your mother doesn't know about that... Speaking of Sally, Zeus, is it OK to bring her here, just for the reading of the book?" He asked.

Zeus sighed. "Fine, Brother."

There was a flash of light and a woman and a child, about five, stood in the middle of the room.

"Yes, Lord Zeus?" She asked.

"We have called upon you because we are reading a book about your son," he said bluntly.

Apollo snorted. "Way to be blunt," he muttered. Hermes, Ares, Percy and Grover snickered.

Sally's eyes widened. She looked at Poseidon.

"This book is from the future," he informed her.

"Mommy, who are these big people? Who's that kid?" The little boy asked.

Percy looked incredulously at his younger self. "Was I really that small?" He gawked.

Percy stood up with a smile on his face. He held his hand out to his mother and said, "Hi, I am Percy Jackson and I am from the future."

Sally's eyes widened further, she looked about ready to faint.

She closed her eyes tight thinking, when she opened them she looked the older Percy and hugged him tight.

"How old are you?" She asked. Percy whispered something into her ear and put his finger to his lips.

She looked at Poseidon, "You know, as much as I want to stay, I can't. I have a child that needs caring for. I'm sorry."

She walked to Poseidon who was now standing and gave him a kiss on the cheek. She walked back to the middle of the room picked up the younger Percy and said, "Now if you would be so kind as to flash us back home that would be nice."

With a wave of Zeus's hand they were gone.

Athena resumed reading.

**My mom doesn't like to talk about him because it makes her sad. She has no pictures.**

**See, they weren't married. She told me he was rich and important, and their relationship was a secret. Then one day, he set sail across the Atlantic on some important journey, and he never came back.**

**Lost at sea, my mom told me. Not dead. Lost at sea. **

"hmm, she stretched the truth. Poseidon I'm surprised you have such a good taste in women," said Athena interrupting herself.

Apollo burst out laughing. "you'd know what that taste is, wouldn't you?" He asked between laughs.

Pretty soon all the men, except Poseidon, were laughing. Poseidon just looked plain disgusted.

"What is so funny?" Athena asked.

Poseidon leaned over and whispered into her ear.

Her face turned to Pure disgust. She gagged.

**She worked odd jobs, took night classes to get her high school diploma, and raised me on her own. She never complained or got mad. Not even once. But I knew I wasn't an easy kid.**

**Finally, she married Gabe Ugliano,**

"What kind of name is Ugliano?" Apollo asked. Poseidon glared. He hated that man.

**Who was nice the first thirty seconds we knew him, then showed his true colors as a world-class jerk. When I was young, I nick named him Smelly Gabe. I'm sorry, but it's the truth. The guy reeked like moldy garlic pizza wrapped in gym shorts.**

Everyone gagged.

"She married him to protect you," Athena guessed. Percy nodded.

**Between the two of us, we made my mom's life pretty hard. The way Smelly Gabe treated her, the way he and I got along … well, when I came home is a good example.**

**I walked into our little apartment, hoping my mom would be home from work. Instead, Smelly Gabe was in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blared ESPN. Chips and beer cans were strewn all over the carpet.**

"What a pig!" Artemis said in disgust. Hera, Hestia, Demeter, and Athena all nodded their heads in agreement.

**Hardly looking up, he said around his cigar, "So, you're home."**

"That's it!" Hestia exclaimed. Percy nodded.

"**Where's my mom?"**

"**Working," he said. "You got any cash?"**

"What a disgraceful man!" shouted Demeter.

**That was it. No **_**Welcome back. Good to see you. How has your life been the last six months? **_

**Gabe had put on weight. He looked like a tuskless walrus in thrift-store clothes. He had about three hairs on his head, all combed over his bald scalp, as if that made him handsome or something. **

Everyone looked disgusted.

**He managed the Electronics Mega-Mart in Queens, but he stayed home most of the time. I don't know why he hadn't been fired long before. He just kept on collecting paychecks, spending the money on cigars that made me nauseous, and on beer, of course. Always beer. Whenever I was home, he expected me to provide his gambling funds. He called that our "guy secret." Meaning, if I told my mom, he would punch my lights out.**

Everyone looked shocked.

"He hits you!" Shouted Poseidon. Percy looked down.

"**I don't have any cash," I told him.**

**He raised a greasy eyebrow.**

**Gabe could sniff out money like a bloodhound, which was surprising, since his own smell should've covered up everything else.**

Artemis stood up ready to go down to the mortal world and shoot Gabe trough the heart with a silver arrow, but Athena comforted her and got her to sit back down.

"**You took a taxi from the bus station," he said. "Probably paid with a twenty. Got six, seven bucks in change. Somebody expects to live under this roof, he ought to carry his own weight. Am I right, Eddie?"**

Poseidon's glare looked scary enough to scare Kronos.

**Eddie, the super of the apartment building, looked at me with a twinge of sympathy. "Come on, Gabe," he said. "The kid just got here."**

"Well, he is a little better." Hera said.

"**Am I **_**right**_**?" Gabe repeated.**

**Eddie scowled into his bowl of pretzels. The other two guys passed gas in harmony.**

"Men are pigs." Artemis said. All the goddesses agreed.

"**Fine," I said. I dug a wad of dollars out of my pocket and threw the money on the table. "I hope you lose."**

"As do we." Apollo said. Everyone nodded.

"**Your report card came, brain boy!" he shouted after me. "I wouldn't act so snooty!"**

"Says the man who has less brain cells than a paint brush," stated Athena

**I slammed the door to my room, which really wasn't my room. During the school months, it was Gabe's "study." He didn't study anything in there except old car magazines, but he loved shoving my stuff in the closet, leaving his muddy boots on my windowsill, and doing his best to make the place smell like his nasty cologne and cigars and stale beer. **

**I dropped my suitcase on the bed. Home sweet home.**

**Gabe's smell was almost worse than the nightmares about Mrs. Dodds, or the sound of that old fruit lady's shears snipping the yarn.**

Poseidon grimaced.

**But as soon as I thought that, my legs felt weak. I remembered Grover's look of panic****—how he'd made me promise I wouldn't go home without him. A sudden chill rolled through me. I felt like someone—something—was looking for me right now, maybe pounding its way up the stairs, growing long, horrible talons.**

Everyone held their breath.

**Then I heard my mom's voice. "Percy?"**

Everyone let out a sigh of relief as they heard this.

**She opened the bedroom door, and my fears melted.**

**My mother can make me feel good just by walking into the room.**

"Aww, you're so sweet." Aphrodite said.

Percy blushed.

**Her eyes sparkle and change color in the light. Her smile is as warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but I never think of her as old. When she looks at me, it's like she's seeing all the good things about me, none of the bad.**

Poseidon smiled at one of the many things about her he fell in love with.

**I've never heard her raise her voice or say an unkind word to anyone, not even me or Gabe.**

"**Oh, Percy." She hugged me tight. "I can't believe it. You've grown since Christmas!"**

**Her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform smelled like the best things in the world: chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central.**

"That does sound good." Hades stated.

"I never knew the Lord of the Dead liked candy," said Percy. "Now I know what to get you for your birthday... When is your birthday?" he asked.

"December 21, It wasn't back then but now it is."

**She'd brought me a huge bag of "free samples," the way she always did when I came home.**

"Lucky." Apollo and Hermes said.

**We sat together on the edge of the bed. While I attacked the blueberry sour strings, she ran her hand through my hair and demanded to know everything I hadn't put in my letters. She didn't mention anything about my getting expelled. She didn't seem to care about that. But was I okay? Was her little boy doing all right?**

"Wow, I wish we had a mother like that."

**I told her she was smothering me, and to lay off and all that, but secretly, I was really, really glad to see her.**

"Typical males," Artemis said rolling her eyes, "never admitting their feelings."

**From the other room, Gabe yelled, "Hey, Sally—how about some bean dip, huh?"**

"Maybe you should get off that fat ass of yours and get it yourself," said Hermes.

"Language!" shouted Hera.

**I gritted my teeth**

**My mom is the nicest lady in the world. She should've been married to a millionaire,**

"Or a god." The whole room sang.

**Not to some jerk like Gabe.**

**For her sake, I tried to sound upbeat about my last days at Yancy Academy. I told her I wasn't too down about the expulsion. I'd lasted almost the whole year this time. I'd made some new friends. I'd done pretty well in Latin. And honestly, the fights hadn't been as bad as the headmaster said. I liked Yancy Academy. I really did. I put such a good spin on the year, I almost convinced myself.**

"You shouldn't lie to your mother," said Demeter.

**I started choking up, thinking about Grover and Mr. Brunner.**

"Look, he cares about Chiron and Grover," Apollo shouted.

Everyone looked at him like he was crazy... which he was.

**Even Nancy Bobofit suddenly didn't seem so bad.**

**Until that trip to the museum …**

"**What?" my mom asked. Her eyes tugged at my conscience, trying to pull out the secrets. "Did something scare you?"**

"Tell her, she'll understand, shes clear sighted," Poseidon said.

"**No, Mom."**

Poseidon sighed.

**I felt bad lying.**

"As you should." Poseidon said, Percy smiling sheepishly.

**I wanted to tell her about Mrs. Dodds and the three old ladies with the yarn, but I thought it would sound stupid.**

"Not to her." Poseidon stated.

**She pursed her lips. She knew I was holding back, but she didn't push me.**

"**I have a surprise for you," she said. "We're going to the beach."**

**My eyes widened. "Montauk?"**

"**Three nights—same cabin."**

Poseidon smiled at the memories of that place, as did Percy.

"**When?"**

**She smiled. "As soon as I get changed."**

**I couldn't believe it. My mom and I hadn't the last two summers, because Gabe said there wasn't enough money.**

"I bet there would've been enough money if Smelly Gabe hadn't gambled it all." Hermes said. Poseidon nodded his head in agreement.

**Gabe appeared in the doorway and growled, "Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear me?"**

**I wanted to punch him,**

"Do it!" Ares, Apollo, Hermes, Poseidon, and even Artemis, shouted.

**But I met my mom's eyes and I understood she was offering me a deal: be nice to Gabe for a little while. Just until she was ready to leave for Montauk. Then we would get out of here.**

"Aww," Ares groaned.

"**I was on my way, honey," she told Gabe. "We were just talking about the trip."**

**Gabe's eyes got small. "The trip? You mean you were serious about that?"**

"**I knew it," I muttered. "He won't let us go."**

"He will," Poseidon growled.

"**Of course he will," my mom said evenly. "Your step father is just worried about money. That's all. Besides," she added, "Gabriel won't have to settle for bean dip. I'll make him enough seven-layer dip for the whole weekend. Guacamole. Sour cream. The works."**

"She sure knows how to bribe a man."

**Gabe softened a bit. "So this money for your trip … it comes out of your clothes budget, right?"**

Aphrodite gasped.

"**Yes, honey," my mother said.**

"**And you won't take my car anywhere but there and back."**

"**We'll be very careful."**

"You should crash it," Ares said.

**Gabe scratched his double chin. "Maybe if you hurry with that seven-layer dip … And maybe if the kid apologizes for interrupting my poker game."**

"Oh yeah, because he really interrupted," Apollo said rolling his eyes.

**Maybe if I kick you in your soft spot, I thought. And make you sing soprano for a week.**

The room erupted in laughter.

"Man, I think you could beat Ares' comebacks," Apollo said.

**But my mom's eyes warned me not to make him mad.**

**Why did she put up with this guy?**

"For you," sighed Poseidon

**I wanted to scream. Why did she care what he thought?**

"**I'm sorry," I muttered. "I'm really sorry I interrupted your incredibly important poker game. Please go back to it right now."**

Everyone snickered.

**Gabe's eyes narrowed. His tiny brain was probably trying to detect sarcasm in my statement.**

"**Year, whatever," he decided.**

**He went back to his game.**

"**Thank you, Percy," my mom said. "Once we get to Montauk, we'll talk more about… whatever you've forgotten to tell me, okay?"**

**For a moment, I thought I saw anxiety in her eyes—the same fear I'd seen in Grover during the bus ride—as if my mom too felt an odd chill in the air.**

"She probably did," Poseidon stated.

**But then her smile returned, and I figured I must have been mistaken. She ruffled my hair and went to make Gabe his seven-layer dip.**

**An hour later we were ready to leave.**

**Gabe took a break from his poker game long enough to watch me lug my mom's bags to the car.**

"He should've been the one to carry the bags," Hera said.

**He kept griping and groaning about losing her cooking—and more important, his '78 Camaro—for the whole weekend.**

"**Not a scratch on this car, brain boy," he warned me as I loaded the last bag. "Not on little scrath."**

"Like I said, you should crash the car," Ares said.

"Well it's not like Percy will be the one driving," Poseidon said to Ares.

Ares shrugged and said, "He should still do it."

**Like I'd be the one driving. I was twelve. But that didn't matter to Gabe. If a seagull so much as pooped on his paint job, he'd find a way to blame me. **

**Watching him lumber back toward the apartment building, I got so mad I did something I can't explain. As Gabe reached the doorway, I made the hand gesture I'd seen Grover make on the bus, a sort of warding-off-evil gesture, a clawed hand over my heart, then a shoving movement toward Gabe. The screen door slammed shut so hard it whacked him in the butt and sent him flying up the stair case as if he'd been shot from a cannon.**

Everyone laughed.

**Maybe it was just the wind, or some freak accident with the hinges, but I didn't stay long enough to find out.**

**I got in the Camaro and told my mom to step on it.**

**Our rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken into dunes. There was always sand in the sheets and spiders in the cabinets,**

Athena shuddered at the mention of spiders.

**And most of the time the sea was too cold to swim in.**

**I loved the place.**

"I do too," Poseidon said smiling.

**We'd been going there since I was a baby. My mom had been going even longer. She never exactly said, but I knew why the beach was special to her. It was the place where she'd met my dad.**

All the goddesses cooed, while Poseidon smiled.

**As we got closer to Montauk, she seemed to grow younger, years of worry and work disappearing from her face. Her eyes turned the color of the sea. **

Poseidon smiled fondly.

**We got there at sunset, opened all the cabin's windows, and went through our usual cleaning routine. We walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples my mom had brought from work.**

"What's with all the blue food?" Hermes asked.

**I guess I should explain the blue food.**

"That would be helpful," Hermes said.

**See, Gabe had once told my mom there was no such thing. They had this fight, which seemed like a really small thing at the time. But ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop. This—along with keeping her maiden name, Jackson, rather than calling herself Mrs. Ugliano—**

"That would be an attractive name," Apollo said snickering.

**was proof that she wasn't totally suckered by Gabe. She did have a rebellious streak, like me.**

**When it got dark, we made a fire. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom told me stories about when she was a kid, back before he parents died in the plane crash. She told me about the books she wanted to write someday, when she had enough to quit the candy shop.**

**Eventually, I got up the nerve to ask about what was always on my mind whenever we came to Montauk—my father. Mom's eyes went all misty. I figured she would tell me the same things she always did, but I never got tired of hearing them.**

Everyone smiled.

"**He was kind, Percy," she said. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his green eyes."**

"Wow, I'm surprised she is still in love with you," Athena said.

Poseidon glared at her. "Excuse me."

**Mom fished a blue jelly bean out of her candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud."**

"I am proud," Poseidon said smiling.

**I wondered how she could say that. What was so great about me? A dyslexic, hyperactive boy with a D+ report card, kicked out of school for the sixth time in six years.**

"I don't care that, Percy." Poseidon said. Percy blushed and looked at his shoes.

"**How old was I?" I asked. "I mean … when he left?"**

**She watched the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin."**

"**But… he knew me as a baby."**

"**No, honey. He knew I was expecting a baby, but he never saw you. He had to leave before you were born."**

**I tried to square that with the fact that I seemed to remember … something about my father. A warm glow. A smile.**

"I did visit," Poseidon said.

**I had always assumed he knew me as a baby. My mom had never said it outright, but still, I'd felt it must be true. Now, to be told that he'd never even seen me…**

**I felt angry at my father.**

Poseidon flinched.

**Maybe it was stupid, but I resented him for going on that ocean voyage, for not having the guys to marry my mom. He'd left us, and now we were stuck with Smelly Gabe.**

"**Are you going to send me away again?" I asked her. "To another boarding school?"**

**She pulled a marshmallow from the fire.**

"**I don't know, honey." Her voice was heavy. "I think … I think we'll have to do something."**

"**Because you don't want me around?"**

"Of course not!" Hera exclaimed. Percy looked sheepish

**I regretted the words as soon as they were out.**

**My mom's eyes welled with tears. She took my hand, squeezed it tight. "Oh, Percy, no. I—I **_**have**_** to, honey. For your own good. I have to send you away."**

**Her words reminded me of what Mr. Brunner had said—that it was best for me to leave Yancy.**

"**Because I'm not normal," I said.**

"**You say that as if it's a bad thing, Percy. But you don't realize how important you are. I thought Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought you'd be finally safe."**

"**Safe from what?"**

"Safe from monsters," Athena said.

"It sounds like your telling him not to look under his bed," stated Apollo, Athena rolling her eyes.

**She met my eyes, and a flood of memories came back to me—all the weird, scary things that had ever happened to me, some of which I'd tried to forget.**

**During third grade, a man in a black trench coat had stalked me on the playground. When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed me when I told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head.**

"huh, maybe I sent him to check on you," Poseidon wondered aloud.

**Before that—a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that a snake had slithered into. My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with a limp, scaly rope I'd somehow managed to strangle to death with my meaty toddler hands.**

"Impressive," said Ares

**In every single school, something creepy had happened, something unsafe, and I was forced to move.**

**I knew I should tell my mom about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds at the art museum, about my weird hallucination that I had sliced my math teacher into dust with a sword.**

"You really should," stated Athena.

**But I couldn't make myself tell her. I had a strange feeling the news would end our trip to Montauk, and I didn't want that.**

"Don't be selfish," Hera said motherly.

"**I've tried to keep you as close to me as I could," my mom said. "They told me that was a mistake. But there's only one other option, Percy—the place your father wanted to send you. And I just… I just can't stand to do it."**

"**My father wanted me to go to a special school?"**

"**Not a school," she said softly. "A summer camp."**

**My head was spinning. Why would my dad—who hadn't even stayed around long enough to see me born— talk to my mom about a summer camp? And if it was so important, why hadn't she ever mentioned it before?**

"**I'm sorry, Percy," she said, seeing the look in my eyes. "But I can't talk about it. I—I couldn't send you to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good."**

Poseidon sighed, he knew she wouldn't want to let go of Percy but she had to eventually.

"**For good? But if it's only a summer camp …"**

**She turned toward the fire, and I knew from her expression that if I asked her any more questions she would start to cry.**

**That night I had a vivid dream.**

"Hopefully, it's not to bad," Poseidon said.

**It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle, were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf.**

"Oh, now I get it," Athena muttered under her breath.

**The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse reared up and kicked at the eagles wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuckled somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.**

"Hades or You-Know-Who?" Hera asked indefinitely.

Hermes perked up. "Voldimort?" Hera pinched the bridge of her nose and let out a sigh.

**I ran toward them, knowing I had to stop them from killing each other, but I was running in slow motion.**

**I knew I would be too late. I saw the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, and I screamed, **_**No!**_

"Dramatic much," Apollo murmured.

**I woke with a start. **

**Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.**

**With the next thunderclap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane."**

**I knew that was crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer But the ocean seemed to have forgotten.**

"I probably did forget," interrupted Poseidon

**Over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end.**

**Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice—someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door.**

"Who is it," asked Ares stupidly.

"Well, the title said 'Grover loses his pants' I'm gonna guess Grover." Athena replied.

**My mother sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock. **

**Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn't… he wasn't exactly Grover.**

"What do you mean 'not exactly Grover'?" Apollo asked.

"If you let me read, maybe we'll find out," said Athena rolling her eyes.

"**Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?"**

**My mother looked at me in terror—not scared of Grover, but of why he'd come.**

"**Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"**

**I was frozen, looking at Grover. I couldn't understand what I was seeing.**

"He's a satyr. We get it," Dionysus said, startling everybody in the room.

"_**O Zeu kai alloi theoi!**_**" he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you **_**tell**_** her?"**

**I was too shocked to register that he'd just cursed in Ancient Greek, and I'd understood him perfectly. I was too shocked to wonder how Grover had gotten here by himself in the middle of the night. Because Grover didn't have his pants on—**

"So that's where the title comes in," said Apollo, every one else rolling their eyes.

**And where his legs should be … where his legs should be…**

**My mom looked at me sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "**_**Percy.**_** Tell me **_**now**_**!"**

**I stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stared at me, her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning.**

**She grabbed her purse, tossed me my rain jacket, and said, "Get to the car. Both of you. **_**Go**_**!"**

"YES! ACTION!" Ares yelled.

**Grover ran for the Camaro— but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense to me. I understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked.**

**Because where his feet should be, there were no feet. There were cloven hooves.**

"End of chapter. Who-," she was cut off by a piece of parchment floating from the ceiling into her hands.

"_Dear gods, Percy and Grover,_

_I have been asked by a fine young lady (ouch!) to let her join the reading with you since she knows nothing of Percy's first two adventures. Also with a boy who would like to join too. And I have granted them able to join. They will appear before you start the next chapter._

_Sincerely,  
>Apollo From the Future," <em>Read Athena.

"Ok, then. Who's reading next?" Asked Athena.

"I would like to," said the oh so quiet Hestia, Raising her hand.

"The next chapter is titled..."

* * *

><p><strong>So there it is. again sorry for the wait hope you liked it. Now press that button at the bottom of the page please.<strong>

**WITH LOVE**

**lovely1227**


	6. OMG IM SORRY

**HEY PPL IM SORRY FOR THIS BUT IM PUTTING THIS STORY ON HOLD I JUST GOT THIS BRILLIANT IDEA OF A STORY FOR OURAN HSHC AND I REALLY WANT TO START IT AND GET A FEW CHAPTERS IN WELL ANYWAYS THAT WAS SHORT... Ya...**

**WITH LOVE**

**lovely1227  
><strong>


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